* * * * *
“Clay dust.”
“Yes, sir, that’s what the coroner believes the substance is which he found on the deceased’s clothing and shoes, as if the fellow had been crouching or sitting in the stuff,” Sergeant Simon Bartholomew said, looking up from his notes. “I could scrounge up a chemist to have a look at it as well, though.”
Tipple shook his head. “Troublesome at half-past seven on a Sunday morning. Even so, did Dr. Hansworth give any more detail about what sort of clay? As in river silt, or pottery, or plain earth?”
Simon consulted his notes again. “He said it was a fine sort, evenly colored, as used in kiln-fired ceramics. Dishware and the like. And I expect he’s seen plenty of river leavings to discount silt.”
The inspector pursed his lips and ran a hand through his hair.
Simon let the old man think in peace for a moment. The sergeant knew at least one of the Harker family’s factories made dinnerware and wondered if Tipple would order a search of all premises related to it. A move like that certainly wouldn’t be popular with the family – or the larger public – but manhunts for escaped murderers could afford to step on finer sensibilities.
“Sit down, Sergeant,” Tipple said, interrupting Bartholomew’s thoughts.
The inspector leaned back in his desk chair, steepling his fingers, and regarded Simon in silence for a moment.
“Have you ever watched a magician’s act before?”
“Sir?”
Tipple lit a cigarette from the butt of one still smoldering in the ashtray on his desk and inhaled deeply.
“Have you ever visited a country fair and stopped to watch a conjurer or magician perform sleights of hand?” the inspector said again, his words riding a curl of tobacco smoke. “He dazzles you; blinds you by spectacle, or by a flourish, or encourages you to look elsewhere while the trick is played. ‘Look here,’ he says, and we do, and then we look again and are amazed.”
Simon nodded. “But the rabbit is still in the box.”
“Hidden behind a mirror,” Tipple agreed. “And we’ve seen only what we expected.”
“…Sir?”
“I have been chasing the Harkers ever since the former patriarch, Ernest Harker, finagled his son Winston – the current patriarch – out of a dual charge of rape and murder fifteen years ago. And for fifteen years I’ve chased this family: always watching for one of them to finally stumble. Openly waiting in the wings for one of them to finally leave the evidence I need to make a case strong enough for a conviction.”
“Nicholas Harker did.”
Tipple studied the smoke wafting from his cigarette for a moment.
“Did he?” the old man murmured.
“Sir?”
“Having wanted the Harkers and their societal rot to come tumbling down for so long, I saw everything I wished to see when we came upon that young devil holding a bloody knife. The evidence accompanying Nicholas Harker’s arrest was dazzling, and the trail of breadcrumbs that led from there to the witch’s house was spellbinding.”
“What…what are you saying, sir?”
“That, as bad as the Harkers are, there’s someone worse in the mix who’s murdered to achieve his ends against the family. They’ve been set up.”
The look on Tipple’s face was dreadful as he said this, and Simon realized he was seeing – for perhaps the first time ever – the old man let his usually checked emotions slip free. Anger made the detective’s blue eyes flash, and another, darker emotion flushed his cheeks a light but obvious shade of rose.
“Why are you thinking this, sir? Now, of all times?”
Tipple pursed his lips. “Because, Sergeant – wild though this conjecture may be – I can see no reason for any of what’s happened these last three days to have happened at all if a Harker spearheaded the scheme.”
He reached across his desk and brushed his finger along a small, framed portrait of his wife. After a moment, the inspector went on in a musing voice.
“If I can make two generalities about the Harkers, they are as follows. First, whenever the Harkers come under scrutiny by the law, they draw their people in and seal up their operations to give the police no additional fodder. Secondly, loyalty within the family is fierce, but the repercussions for betrayal are brutal.”
He mashed out his cigarette in the ashtray.
“We’ve gone over the case’s inconsistencies time and again. However, what is perhaps the greatest contradiction or quandary is Frank O’Malley’s murder. Given the man’s connections, he might have met his end for some reason wholly unrelated with our current investigation. And it is also conceivable that he betrayed Nicholas Harker or someone else in the family in some terrible way that merited a swift execution, heedless of timing. But this seems completely against a typical Harker’s public business scruples.
“Add to this my confidence in Dr. Hansworth’s abilities. The hand that killed Mr. O’Malley is the same that killed Milo Gervais and all those others.”
Tipple pursed his lips. “I begin to think, therefore, that perhaps I should look at the whole situation from the opposite direction. Turn it on its head, and all. If it is so unfathomable and unreasonable that our escapee killed the one who seemed to be his greatest ally, perhaps his hand wasn’t the one holding the knife at all.”
“...Which would also mean he didn’t kill Gervais or any of the others,” Simon said slowly.
Tipple nodded.
“Nicholas Harker signed a confession.”
“And those are always honest? Mr. Harker may be merely complicit…or even innocent altogether.”
For the barest instant, the sergeant thought he knew what sentiment had darkened the old man’s expression, but then dismissed the notion at once. There could be no possible reason for Tipple to feel guilty.
“This calls into question everything we’ve taken for granted about the manhunt thus far,” the old detective said. “While I find the traces of ceramic dust on Mr. O’Malley’s clothing an enticing lead, I fear it may be a red herring. Something planted to lead us astray from our true objective.”
“Where do we go from here then, sir?”
Simon sincerely hoped Tipple had thought that far ahead, for the sergeant hadn’t an idea where to turn in a case the inspector had just rent to shambles. Fortunately, the old man had.
“Perhaps we’ll find our man if we search out whomever it is who will benefit most greatly from the collapse of the Harkers’ empire; that is, discover the person or group who will step into the vacuum.
“However,” the inspector went on, standing, “we must carry on without alerting this magician that we are catching on to his tricks. So we go wherever the evidence – the ceramic dust – leads us. Given events, I can only think the perpetrator is moving his plans quickly toward a predetermined close.”
“You don’t think we can prevent whatever’s coming.”
Simon’s alarm must have been plain in his expression, because the inspector gave the sergeant a gentle squeeze on the arm as they both moved toward the door.
“The magician will have his show,” Tipple’s face and voice back to their normal, reassuring mildness. “But at least we’ll be expecting his tricks and will see more than he expects of us.”